Welding systems reside at the core of the modern industrial age. From massive automobile assembly operations to automated manufacturing environments, these systems facilitate joining in ever more complicated manufacturing operations. One such example of a welding system includes an electric arc welding system. This may involve movement of a consumable electrode, for example, toward a workpiece while current is passed through the electrode and across an arc developed between the electrode and the workpiece. The electrode may be a non-consumable or consumable type, wherein portions of the electrode may be melted and deposited on the workpiece. Often, hundreds or perhaps thousands of welders are employed to drive multiple aspects of an assembly process, wherein sophisticated controllers enable individual welders to operate within relevant portions of the process. For example, some of these aspects relate to control of power and waveforms supplied to the electrode, movements or travel of a welding tip during welding, electrode travel to other welding points, gas control to protect a molten weld pool from oxidation at elevated temperatures and provide ionized plasma for an arc, and other aspects such as arc stability to control the quality of the weld. These systems are often deployed over great distances in larger manufacturing environments and many times are spread across multiple manufacturing centers. Given the nature and requirements of modem and more complex manufacturing operations however, welding systems designers, architects and suppliers face increasing challenges in regard to upgrading, maintaining, controlling, servicing and supplying various welding locations. Unfortunately, many conventional welding systems operate in individually controlled and somewhat isolated manufacturing locations in regard to the overall assembly process. Thus, controlling, maintaining, servicing and supplying multiple and isolated locations in large centers, and/or across the globe, has become more challenging, time consuming and expensive. Moreover, managing accurate records or data associated with controlling, maintaining, servicing, and supplying multiple locations has become more challenging.
As mentioned, welding environments are often isolated and geographically removed from one another and what is needed is an improved welding architecture to facilitate monitoring, configuration, control, maintenance, and/or supply to multiple welding systems that may be distributed across large areas or regions.